CHARTER BASICS
Charter schools are public schools that are given flexibility in exchange for meeting education goals laid out in the school’s charter.
Georgia has more than 100 charter schools, most of them approved by local school boards. The state Board of Education can overrule a local board that rejects a charter application.
This Election Day, voters will consider a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would establish a commission to consider charter applications. Passage of the amendment would also clarify the state’s power to authorize and fund charter schools.
Opponents say the amendment is unnecessary because there are already two ways for a charter application to be approved. They say local boards, not an appointed commission, should be the primary place where charter applications are considered. And they say more charter schools approved by the commission would take scarce funding from traditional public schools.
Supporters say the amendment say is needed to clarify and protect the state’s power to authorize and fund charter schools.
During what were supposed to be training sessions, the Georgia School Boards Association instructed school board members on how to oppose the charter schools amendment, some school board members have complained.
The complaints, which could later be part of a legal action against the GSBA, highlight the rising intensity in the battle over the proposed amendment to Georgia’s constitution, which has drawn national attention as a focus of the argument between more school choice and the need to protect traditional public schools.
GSBA’s opposition to the amendment during the association’s annual conference in June “really crossed the line,” said Nancy Jester, a DeKalb County School Board member who was there. “I was really shocked.”
But GSBA Executive Director Jeannie “Sis” Henry said it is the association’s job to “provide information on issues related to the roles, responsibilities and concerns of local board members,” and that’s what was done.
“The Constitutional Amendment is certainly one of the most important issues board members have faced in years and superintendents and school board members have a responsibility and a constitutional right to express themselves as individuals and elected officials on issues of public concern,” Henry said.
GSBA, a trade association that collects dues from school boards and is one of a few groups approved by the state to offer mandatory school board member training, has also sent them anti-amendment e-mails, school board members said.
“That’s a blatant example of them going beyond advocacy and going into the world of telling people what they should and shouldn’t support,” Cobb County School Board Member David Morgan said.
Georgia law bars elected officials from using taxpayer resources to participate in political campaigns.
Opponents of the charter schools amendment have said its backers are using that law in an attempt to stifle opposition and increase the chances that the amendment will be approved by voters in November.
The amendment would establish a commission to consider charter applications. Its passage would also clarify the state’s power to authorize and fund charter schools. Currently charter schools in Georgia can be approved only by the locality’s school board or the state Board of Education.
Backers of the amendment have also made public efforts at persuasion. Legislators have actively supported it. Gov. Nathan Deal has endorsed it in public speeches.
Atlanta attorney Glenn Delk said he is contemplating legal action against the school boards association because of its push against the amendment. At the heart of any action would be a secretly taped session in June when Henry made a detailed presentation to board members about how they can participate in the campaign against the amendment.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution was given access to the tape in exchange for not revealing who made it.
On the tape, Henry cited the anti-amendment campaign as “a put the flag in the sand moment” for public education, which she said would be threatened by the amendment’s passage.
Told of some board members’ complaints about what they saw as inappropriate advocacy, Henry said: “Board members have an essential role in communicating with constituents and it was in this vein that my comments were made. I received no complaints from participants at the session. Indeed, the feedback was very positive.”
Delk, who said he is representing individual clients he has declined to identify, has already complained to the state Board of Education that Georgia Schools Superintendent John Barge inappropriately used taxpayer resources to oppose the amendment.
Barge announced his opposition in August and issued a 29-point position paper highlighting the reasons. A link to that paper was on the Georgia Department of Education’s home page.
Last week, after Delk complained and Barge conferred with the attorney general’s office, the department removed the link to that paper. And on Tuesday, an alert scrolled across the department’s Web page telling viewers that the department has no position on the charter schools amendment.
Matt Cardoza, a spokesman for the department, said the goal has been to make it clear that Barge’s opposition is personal. He said the department has not had a position on the proposed amendment and will not adopt one.
Barge, meanwhile, has said he plans to continue opposing the amendment.
Deal’s spokesman, Brian Robinson, said the governor’s office will also remove from its website any suggestion of how Georgians should vote on the proposed amendment.
“While it’s well within the governor’s rights to explain to Georgians where he stands on the issue, we are happy to play by the same rules as the superintendent’s office,” Robinson said. “The governor, however, will not stop working to give every Georgia family school choice so that no child is trapped hopelessly in a failing school.”
Like Barge, GSBA opposes the amendment, arguing it would allow an unelected state commission to approve charter applications that local school boards denied. Opponents also argue that its passage and the subsequent approval of additional charter schools would pull money away from traditional public schools.
Proponents of the amendment say it is needed to make clear that the state has the power to approve charter schools, which they say are important alternatives for children trapped in failing traditional public schools.
Some school boards have passed resolutions urging opposition to the amendment. The Douglas County School Board did that Monday night. Its resolution passed despite the objections of one member, Mike Miller, who told his colleagues that he believed it is against Georgia law for the board to participate in a campaign.
“As a board, we need to avoid things like this,” said Miller, an attorney.
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